I have been alerted by Dave of Solarventi to a 'debate' raging on the Jeremy Vine show (actually Matthew Bannister) on R2 regarding fines for bin taxes.
A lot of arguments made (and coming in as I write) are now well recycled (!), but one issue raised by the 'experts' struck me and hence I have written in:
Just listening to the 'debate', where the facts flying around, especially without much context, are worth as much as stats.
If there have been 'only' 1,000 prosecutions so far, one presumes these to have been successful. How many have not been? What have been the costs to the taxpayer of people and systems to generate this deterrent/revenue generator, over and above the ever so slight public negative perception of anything green hued these days (VED anyone?).
I suspect the £70k garnered so far might not have covered the costs of a few Civ. Servants for one year, and hence how much has been wasted that could have gone in much greener and more efficient directions?
Junkk.com promotes fun, reward-based e-practices, sharing oodles of info in objective, balanced ways. But we do have personal opinions, too! Hence this slightly ‘off of site, top of mind' blog by Junkk Male Peter. Hopefully still more ‘concerned mates’ than 'do this... or else' nannies, with critiques seen as constructive or of a more eyebrow-twitching ‘Oh, really?!' variety. Little that’s green can be viewed only in black and white.
Monday, August 04, 2008
1 comment:
I believe in freedom of speech. But I also don't like bullies on blogs, even verbal ones, as they can drive away those with something valid to say... or offer.
Subjective is fine, but well argued and substantiated is even better. Calm and polite tops. Anything that crosses my personal line will not go up. There may be reasons given, but not guaranteed.
I'm not too keen on 'Anon' as a handle (and the content usually explains why), so if that's what you opt for it may not make it. Sorry.
1,000 fines this last year.
ReplyDelete10,000 in the next year?
100,000 in 2010?
1,000,000 a year by 2015?
Fines systems do seem to have a self fulfilling means of accelerating themselves. (Think Parking Wardens, Traffic Cameras etc.)